Gravity on Mercury
Has the weight of living on planet Earth got you down? Maybe you should lighten up and move to Mercury. The gravity on Mercury is 38% the gravity on Earth. In other words, if you weigh 100 kilograms here on Earth, you would only weigh 38 kilograms on Mercury.
But you'd still be as strong, so you'd be able to jump up 2.6 times as high as you could jump on Earth.
You might find that the gravity on Mercury is surprisingly high. The planet itself is only 4,879 km across. That's only a little bigger than the Moon, which is only 3,474 km across. And gravity on the Moon is 16% the gravity on the Earth. That's because the density of Mercury is very high. In fact, it's the second densest planet in the Solar System after the Earth.
Of course, the temperature on Mercury is so high, you'd need to be able to jump around, to keep away from all the hot rocks.
Filed under: Astronomy
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